Catholic Archdiocese of Cincinnati warns against politicking in parishes

The Catholic Archdiocese of Cincinnati this week sent a letter to all local parishes warning them to keep politics off the pulpit.

The letter reminds pastors and parishioners that church
leadership may not endorse parties or candidates or take any action that
could be construed as endorsement, let candidates or parties use church
facilities, distribute political materials in church or use church
publications to promote a party or candidate.

“The Church has the responsibility to provide moral
guidance on political issues; however, the Church does not wish to
engage in political activity,” Chancellor the Rev. Steve Angi wrote in
the Oct. 24 letter.

Some Cincinnati-area parishes had placed stacks of tickets
to a rally for Rep. Paul Ryan or stacks of Republican sample ballots,
according to Parishes Without Politics, a group of lay Catholics.

“We think the Cincinnati Archdiocese’s letter should be a
model for bishops nationwide and the rest of the Church leadership,”
group spokesperson Deborah Rose-Milavec wrote in an emailed statement.

“Catholics should feel free to vote their own consciences
without being bombarded by partisan political messages from the pulpits,
on parish websites, in parish bulletins, in the vestibules or anywhere
else on parish property.”

CityBeat has previously written about how both major
parties are using different aspects of Catholic social teaching to woo
voters.

Someone really smart in Todd Portune’s office warned his
or her superiors that the monthly first-Wednesday siren test might scare
the living hell out of tens of thousands of foreign people visiting
Cincinnati for the World Choir Games, so there will be no siren test
this month.

Anderson Cooper publicly announced that he’s gay after a discussion with friend
and journalist Andrew Sullivan of The Daily Beast regarding celebrities
coming out. Cooper emailed Sullivan about the matter and gave him
permission to print it.

“I’ve also been reminded recently that while as a society
we are moving toward greater inclusion and equality for all people, the
tide of history only advances when people make themselves fully visible.
There continue to be far too many incidences of bullying of young
people, as well as discrimination and violence against people of all
ages, based on their sexual orientation, and I believe there is value in
making clear where I stand.

“The fact is, I'm gay, always have been, always will be, and I couldn’t be any more happy, comfortable with myself, and proud.”

The NFL is going to back off some of its local blackout
rules. Teams now must only hit 85 percent of their ticket sales goal
rather than 100 percent to avoid making local markets watch crappy
regional games instead of their favorite teams. That means more Bengals games, less crappy Browns broadcasts.

Hey, I want to let you in on a secret: There's an election in Ohio today. Super Tuesday is finally here, with more delegates at stake in the race for Republican presidential nominee than any other single day in the 2012 campaign season. There are seven primaries (Ohio, Georgia, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Vermont and Virginia) and three caucuses (Alaska, Idaho and North Dakota) today. A total of 410 delegates – or 17.9 percent of the total – are up for grabs.

Officials at the Hamilton County Board of Elections are estimating that 30 percent of eligible voters will cast ballots today. Turnout probably will be low because the elections board only has received about 8,000 absentee ballots so far, compared to 26,000 by this time in 2010. Polls are open from 6:30 a.m. until 7:30 p.m. If you're unsure where to vote, click here.

City Council is moving ahead with a plan to spend up to $100,000 to introduce priority-based budgeting in Cincinnati. The cash will fund a consultant to survey community leaders and residents to establish strategic priorities. City leaders would then try to align resources with what the community values the most, said Vice Mayor Roxanne Qualls, who heads council's Budget and Finance Committee. Council will convene a series of public forums in the next two months, and attempt to identify five to seven priorities based on the input.

Just two days after he said it was premature to ask the federal government for help, Gov. John Kasich has reversed course. A team from the Federal Emergency Management Agency will arrive today in Clermont County to survey storm damage and gauge whether the region qualifies for financial assistance. Kasich had a change of heart after he spoke with U.S. Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Miami Township), who told the guv that local officials wanted immediate federal aid. (So, when exactly is the next gubernatorial election?)

Little Miami Local School Board members want to meet with Ohio education officials after a commission rejected their plan to restore some services in the school district. The state Financial Planning and Supervision Commission unanimously rejected the district’s reconfiguration plan for 2012-13. Little Miami was placed in fiscal emergency by the state after several levies failed before a November levy narrowly passed.

Reductions to Medicare and other federal health-care programs could total $360 billion over the next 10 years, causing problems for hospitals that depend on the government payments, according to a new report from Moody’s Investors Service. Medicare covered 39 percent of in-patient days at Greater Cincinnati hospitals in 2010, a market overview found. (I don't want to hear a single complaint about this from our conservative Republican readers, as this is what you've sought for years.)

In news elsewhere, Iran is starting to feel the impact of international sanctions as demand for its crude oil begins to drop. In January, China, South Korea and Singapore reduced their oil purchases from Iran, and Shipping Corp. of India last month canceled an Iranian shipment because its European insurers refused to provide coverage for the tanker. Traders say Iran's troubles only will increase once an European Union oil embargo begins July 1.

Crazy religious dude is at it again. No, not Rick Santorum – we're referring to Pat Robertson, the erstwhile host of TV's The 700 Club. On the program Monday, the aging pastor opined that the recent outbreak of tornadoes might not have occurred if people had prayed for divine intervention. “If enough people were praying, He would’ve intervened," he said. "You could pray, 'Jesus stilled the storm, you can still storms.'” He also told viewers who live in areas prone to natural disasters that it’s “their fault, not God’s.” Way to show the compassion of Christ there, Pat.

If you're under the impression that the Constitution gives the rights of due process and equal protection under the law to U.S. citizens, Attorney General Eric Holder is going to set you wacky kids straight. In a speech Monday at the Northwestern University Law School in Chicago, Holder tried to defend the practice of using automated drones to kill suspected terrorists overseas who have never been convicted of a crime. "The president may use force abroad against a senior operational leader of a foreign terrorist organization with which the United States is at war — even if that individual happens to be a U.S. citizen," Holder said to a mostly disapproving crowd.

Civic leaders in eastern Libya have called for semi-autonomy for the oil-rich region, saying their area has been neglected by the nation's central government for decades. The push for self-government is strong in the region of Cyrenaica, but the governing National Transitional Council says it could lead to Libya's demise as a unified nation.

When The Enquirer reported Thursday that Archbishop Dennis Schnurr, head of the Cincinnati Archdiocese for the Catholic Church, would participate in an interfaith 9/11 memorial on Sunday with a Muslim group, it raised a few eyebrows and prompted some emails.

Let’s start the morning roundup with a truly radical idea: How about using Paul Brown Stadium as a homeless shelter during the roughly 340 nights a year when the Bengals aren’t using it?

That’s just what might happen with the new Marlins ballpark or the Tampa Bay Rays' Tropicana Field in Floridaif two state lawmakers have their way. They want to enforce an obscure 1988 Florida law that allows any ballpark or stadium that receives taxpayer money to serve as a homeless shelter on the dates that it is not in use. Sounds like a great idea to us.

The Hamilton County Board of County Commissioners yesterday voted
to keep senior and mental health levies flat. As a result, senior
and mental health services will lose funding. Commissioner Todd Portune,
the Board’s sole Democrat,
offered an alternative measure that would have raised funding to levels
providers requested, before voting with the two Republicans. Portune’s measure would have increased property
taxes by $5 for every $100,000 of property worth.

Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine released a new report
detailing human trafficking in Ohio. The report found one-third of
trafficking victims got involved in trafficking as minors. In all of
Ohio, law enforcement officials topped the list of buyers for human
trafficking. In Cincinnati, the most common buyers were drug dealers,
factory workers and truckers. Forty percent of trafficking victims in
Cincinnati reported being raped.

At the commissioners meeting Wednesday, a Jehova’s
Witnesses group clashed with Harrison Township over land. The religious
group wants to build a hall that they say will attract Jehova’s
Witnesses to the area and bring in tax revenue, but Harrison Township is
worried the building will cause too much disruption. The board will
reach a decision in a few weeks, Commissioner Greg Hartmann said.

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary
Kathleen Sebelius praised Cincinnati Children’s accomplishments during a
visit to a local medical center Wednesday. She also said the medical
progress in Cincinnati “can now be mirrored across the country.”

The Ohio State Bar Association has declared opposition to
the Voters First redistricting amendment. The association says it has
“deep concerns” over getting the judicial system involved in the
redrawing process.

Local political group COAST has been misinforming its
followers about the Blue Ash Airport deal. The misinformation continues
COAST’s campaign to stop anything streetcar-related.

U.S. Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio is among the top choices for
presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s vice presidential list, but a new
analysis from the New York Times shows Portman might not benefit Romney
much. Apparently, Ohio voters either don’t know Portman well enough or
feel completely apathetic about him.

Ohio’s mortgage delinquency rates are falling. The rate
fell from 4.73 percent to 4.54 percent. However, the average mortgage
debt for individual borrowers went up in the second largest jump in the
country. The average Ohio mortgage debt holder now owes $131,701, up
from $126,503.

With all the blather about banning or restricting the construction of mosques in the United States because of Islam's alleged connections to terrorism, now is a good time to examine exactly what the religion is and what its central tenets are.

About 75,000 workers in Greater Cincinnati don't have insurance coverage for contraceptives, The Enquirer reports. Most of those who don't are employed by hospital systems connected to the Catholic Church or religiously affiliated universities, which try to adhere to the church's stance against using birth control. Still, as reporter Cliff Peale writes, “They follow the Catholic directives first, but also have set up financial models that depend on millions of dollars from Medicare, Medicaid and federal student aid programs, and employees who might very well be non-Catholics.” In other words, they want federal largesse, they just don't want to follow federal rules.

Dick Costolo, the CEO of Twitter, will be one of the speakers next week at Procter & Gamble's digital marketing summit. The event, known as Signal P&G, will be held March 8 at the corporation's downtown headquarters. About 20 executives will participate in the summit, which will feature a full day of case studies and one-on-one interviews with industry leaders.

The Cincinnati Board of Education announced today that it wants to renew the contract of Mary Ronan, who has been schools superintendent since April 2009. The board authorized negotiations to be conducted with Ronan over the next month on a three-year contract extension that would take effect on Aug. 1, 2012 and end on July 31, 2015.

In news elsewhere, today might well be the rubicon for the campaign of Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney. Primaries will be held today in Arizona and Romney's native Michigan, where his family is something of a political dynasty. Many pundits say that unless Romney scores a convincing victory in Michigan, his campaign could be in serious trouble against the surging Rick Santorum.

Meanwhile, Romney is angry that some Democratic voters in Michigan are vowing to cross over and cast ballots for Santorum in the GOP primary, to sow chaos. But Romney used a similar tactic and cast a Democratic ballot in Massachusetts's 1992 primary. "In Massachusetts, if you register as an independent, you can vote in either the Republican or Democratic primary," Romney told ABC News. Until he made an unsuccessful run for Senate in 1994, Romney had spent his adult life as a registered independent. "When there was no real contest in the Republican primary, I’d vote in the Democrat primary, vote for the person who I thought would be the weakest opponent for the Republican,” he added.

The Orange One is facing criticism again for his leadership style, or lack thereof. West Chester's favorite son, House Speaker John Boehner, is being chided for fumbling the passage of a major transportation bill. Because Boehner couldn't round up enough votes to pass the bill – which is being touted as the GOP's main jobs plan for 2012 – Boehner had to split the bill into three component parts.

Anti-government protestors in Syria said they found the bodies of 64 men dumped on the outskirts of the city of Homs. An unknown number of women and children who had been with the men are missing, protestors added. The uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began last March, and pressure for U.S. or NATO military intervention is growing due to the violence.

Media musings from Cincinnati and beyond

Amanda
VanBenschoten’s reporting on both sides of the river has won her the
new position of Northern Kentucky news columnist at the Enquirer. We’ve
been friends since she was an undergrad in my ethics class. I had the
pleasure of holding up a copy of the NKU’s paper, The Northerner, and
showing our class her first page 1 byline. She was editor of NKU’s
paper, The Northerner, and worked for a Northern Kentucky weekly where
she regularly broke stories ahead of daily reporters. I warned the
then-editor of the Kentucky Enquirer to follow Amanda’s work because,
“she’ll eat your lunch.” Soon after, that wise editor hired Amanda. I’m looking forward to Amanda finding her own voice after years of
quoting others.

Scott
Aiken died this month. We’ve been colleagues and friends for more than
four decades. My wife and I moved to Cincinnati in 1967 and subscribed
to the Enquirer. I called Scott to compliment the analyses of foreign
events for which he’d been hired on the Enquirer editorial page. After
swapping tales about our work overseas and people we knew there, he
offered to introduce me to Bob Harrod, the local editor, who hired me
for weekend reporting. It was the perfect antidote to grad school. That
began 30-plus years at the Enquirer for me. Scott and I stayed in touch
after he left daily journalism for corporate public relations. Our
friendship survived my reporting of accusations of illegal wiretapping
by Cincinnati Bell; Scott was head of the telephone company’s public
relations. Our last lunch shared stories of his and Anne’s visit to
Rome. Sheila McLaughlin’s obit on March 9 covers his career admirably,
including Scott’s accidental matchmaking for a young
reporter/colleague.

• Urbi et orbi.
Accusations of omission and commission by Pope Francis when he was a
priest and Jesuit leader during Argentina’s murderous “Dirty War”
demonstrate how religious leaders risk charges of collaboration when a
dictatorship falls. Recent examples taint the Russian Orthodox Church
and South Africa’s Dutch Reform Church. But it’s a rare priest who rises
to the modern papacy without the historians, news media and others
questioning their careers. Pius XII is accused of being too close to
Nazi Germany as diplomat Cardinal Pacelli before World War II. John
XXIII was the subject of debate whether, as a chaplain sergeant in World
War I, he gave Italian troops the order to leave their trenches, “go
over the top” and attack. Fourteen-year-old Joseph Ratzinger was drafted
into the Hitler Youth near the end of World War II, something everyone
learned when he became Benedict XVI.

•The
200-plus complaints about papal coverage moved NPR ombudsman Edward
Schumacher-Matos to admit he, too, was “pope-ed out.” One listener
wondered if NPR stood for National Papal Radio? Schumacher-Matos blogged
that “NPR aired 69 stories since Pope Benedict
XVI announced his resignation Feb. 11 and Pope Francis was selected as
his successor Wednesday. That averages out to about two radio magazine
or call-in segments per day, not including the steady drumbeat of
shorter items delivered by hourly newscasts that are not transcribed. Most
of the complaints have concerned the 47 stories that aired in the four
weeks between the day after Benedict announced his resignation and the
morning before Francis was announced — a period during which there was
less major news about the subject and more ‘horse-race’ speculation
about who might be selected.”

•Of
course, there was a Cincinnati connection to the papal election: Janice
Sevre-Duszynska, a contributing writer to Article 25, Cincinnati’s
street paper dedicated to human rights, was detained by Italian police
for demonstrating at the Vatican for women’s ordination. The French news
agency, AFP, missed her connection to Article 25, identifying her only
as “an excommunicated female priest” from Lexington, Ky., and a member of
the Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests. It was unclear whether
Sevre-Duszynska was arrested or removed as a distraction when cardinals
assembled to elect a new pope. AFP did not respond to CityBeat
questions about her detention. She was dressed in liturgical robes and
carrying a banner, “Women Priests are Here.” AFP quoted Sevre-Duszynska
as saying, "As the cardinals meet for their conclave to elect the new pope, women are being ordained around the world! There are already 150 female priests in the world. The people are ready for change."

•Much
as I would have loved to be back in Rome covering the election of the
pope, there was an even better assignment that kicked my envy into
overdrive. The Economist sent a reporter on 112-day road trip through
and around Africa. I once hoped to travel the mythic Cairo Road from
Capetown to Cairo. Not going to happen. The Economist’s reporter did
that and more. He found more cause for cautious optimism than is
reflected in typical stories of rebellion, massacre, poverty, disease
and stolen elections.

•Why
did Cincinnati Business Courier take down its online story about Henry
Heimlich’s attempts to save his reputation and that of his Heimlich
Maneuver? Granted, it wasn’t flattering, but it didn’t go beyond what
Curmudgeon has reported. Reporter James Ritchie forwarded my request
for an explanation and editor Rob Daumeyer responded, “Thanks for asking, but we don't have anything to add for you.”

•I
like the tabloid Enquirer. I worked on daily and weekly tabloids
overseas; it’s a familiar format. Whether readers enjoy turning pages to
find stories promoted on section covers is uncertain; with logos, ads
and visuals, there’s little else. Inside, long stories jump from page
to page to accommodate reduced page size. I hope Enquirer editors
recognize the power of the back page in each section and treat it as
prime news space. And I’m looking forward to reporters and editors
learning to produce sharp, short stories suited to tabloids; it still
reads like the old Enquirer.

•Curmudgeon
Notes on Feb. 20 shouldn’t take credit for Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster
over Obama’s assassination by drone. However, the Kentucky Republican
echoed Curmudgeon’s anxieties whether Obama will use drones to kill
Americans in our country. To his credit, Paul’s almost 13-hour standup
routine forced an answer from prevaricating Attorney General Eric
Holder. Holder’s letter repeated and answered Paul’s question: "Does the
President have the authority to use a weaponized drone to kill an
American not engaged in combat on American soil? The answer to that
question is no.” Perfectly clear? No. Who defines combat? Deadly
confrontations with feds at Ruby Ridge, Wounded Knee, or David Koresh’s
Branch Davidian Ranch near Waco, TX?

•Enquirer’s
Cliff Peale is probing the costs of post-secondary education and how
many recent debt-burdened college grads can’t find full-time employment
requiring their costly degrees. Coincidentally, Cincinnati Business
Courier reports how local vacancies for skilled workers threaten the
region’s economy. Is the conventional wisdom — everyone must earn a BA
or more — undermining our economic security? Maybe Peale can probe high
school curricula and counseling to see if capable students are being
steered away from well-paid blue collar careers and into crippling debt
for degrees of dubious value. Maybe it’s time to interview welders,
carpenters, plumbers, electricians, auto mechanics, etc., to find out
what their ROI (Return on Investment) is.

•It’s an old problem: courtiers mistaking their privilege of emptying the king’s chamber pots for royal power. Poynter.org reports this example from the University of Maryland’s Capital News Service:

Barr
quoted Rosenzweig, saying, “I need to see your camera right now.” She
called Barr’s presence in the non-press area an “unfair advantage” over
the other members of the media (whatever that meant). Rosenzweig watched
him delete the photos, Barr said, and then she looked at Barr’s iPhone
to make sure no photos were saved there.

“I
assumed that I’d violated a protocol,” Barr told Capital News Service.
“I gave her the benefit of the doubt that she was following proper
procedures.”

J-school
Dean Lucy Dalglish complained in a letter, saying, “Rockville is not a
third-world country where police-state style media censorship is
expected.” Biden press secretary Kendra Barkoff responded with an
apology to Dalglish and Barr.

My comment: Dalglish is a lawyer. Before taking the dean’s job she was executive
director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. It’s
ironic that her student reporter didn’t know there is no “protocol” or “proper
procedures” that required him to give up his images. He should have
held on to his images and phone and told Rosenzweig to fuck off.

•Republicans
evince an unnatural fascination with our dead ambassador at the U.S.
consulate in Benghazi. Often, in their frenzy of blame, Obama critics
mistakenly call the torched facility the “Embassy.” Ignorance now
appears to be nonpartisan. Maybe repetition has warped liberal minds.
For instance, in her blog on the thedailybeast.com, Caitlin Dickson repeated the error. In Libya, our embassy is in Tripoli, the capital.

The Boston Globe’s boston.com wasn’t immune. Under
the headline, “Paul Krugman Files Chapter 13 Bankruptcy,” someone using
the nom de plume “Prudent Investor” wrote that “Paul Krugman, the king
of Keynesianism and a strong supporter of the delusion that you can
print your way out of debt, faces depression at his very own doors.
According to this report in Austria’s Format online mag, Krugman owes
$7.35 million while assets to his name came in at a very meager $33,000.
This will allow the economist and New York Times blogger to get a feel
of how the majority of Americans feel about their dreadful lives . . . “

Romenesko
says Globe editor Brian McGrory told Washington Post’s Erik Wemple,
“The (Krugman) story arrived deep within our site from a third party
vendor who partners on some finance and market pages on our site. We
never knew it was there till we heard about it from outside.” The paper,
McGrory says, did “urgent work to get it the hell down” from boston.com.
McGrory adds, “The idea that we’d have a partner on our site is
actually news to me” and the Globe plans to “address our relationship
with that vendor.”

My
comment: the editor of New England’s dominant daily has a “third party
vendor” who provides content for business pages and the editor doesn’t
know what that content is?

•Paul Krugman, who isn’t bankrupt (above), responded tongue in cheek on his New York Times blog, The Conscience of a Liberal. “OK, I’m an evil person — and my scheming has paid off. On
Friday I started hearing from friends about a fake story making the
rounds about my allegedly filing for personal bankruptcy; I even got
asked about the story by a reporter from Russian television, who was
very embarrassed when I told him it was fake. But I decided not to post
anything about it; instead, I wanted to wait and see which right-wing
media outlets would fall for the hoax. And Breitbart.com came through! Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go give a lavishly paid speech to Friends of Hamas.”

•Weekly
Standard senior writer Matt Labash’s March 18 column suggests he’d be a
great guy to meet in a bar. Here’s a sample: “ . . . there are enough
headline-hunting researchers making enough questionable discoveries
(about health) that the four shakiest words in the English language have
come to be, ‘a new study shows’.” And here’s another: “I am a
professional journalist. It’s my job to pretend to know things that I
don’t.”